Franklin Park farmer had passion for growing flowers, relationships
April 17, 1932 - May 2, 2015
One day in 1946, 14-yearold Donald Kaelin and his father took a 20-minute drive from their home in Leetsdale to survey a patch of farmland in Franklin Park.
Nearly seven decades later, the Kaelin Farm Market remains much as it was that day, harvesting a variety of fruits and vegetables from 140 acres in the North Hills. As recounted by Curt Kaelin, Donald’s son, it was a remarkable find.
“The farm they bought just happened to be the perfect spot for it,” Curt Kaelin said. “I’m not sure how anyone would ever start up something like that anymore. It kind of has to be passed down, generation to generation.”
Donald Kaelin, known for his unwavering passion for flower arrangements, smallscale farming and playful pranks, died Saturday at the age of 83.
A native of southwestern Pennsylvania, Mr. Kaelin helped his father on the farm before graduating from Leetsdale High School. From there, he decided to get a degree in agriculture from Penn State University.
For a few years — a rare period away from the farm — he was recruited out of college in the late 1950s to fly a Boeing B-47 Stratojet during the tensest years of the Cold War for the Strategic Air Command, a branch of the U.S. Air Force.
“He had no aspirations to be doing that,” his son said, laughing. “But they needed to build crews.”
It was around this time that Mr. Kaelin’s father died. The farm idled for a few years until Mr. Kaelin came back and began a business that manufactured and sold machinery and equipment to dairy farms in the Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia area.
Curt Kaelin said he suspects that his father used much of the money he made selling steel piping, bulk milk tanks and pasteurizers for the farm.
“He worked with a lot of wonderful people in both businesses, but what he truly enjoyed was the farm,” Curt Kaelin said. “That’s where he was relaxed.”
Little by little, Mr. Kaelin restarted the farm as he had time and a little extra money, his son said.
“Every year, he’d add on. It was a step-by-step, yearby-year transition. Even the greenhouses — maybe we built one new one every year for 10 years.”
As the farm grew, so did opportunities to deliver goods to the community. Kaelin Farms opened as a storefront in 1976, selling sweet corn, peaches, apples, tomatoes, peppers, pumpkins.
In the early 1990s, Mr. Kaelin retired from the dairy equipment business. He became a staple at the farm’s greenhouse and market.
“He was at the market everyday, and enjoyed the customers and all the people that helped us over the years,” his son said.
Paul Merriman worked alongside Mr. Kaelin to cultivate flower arrangements for the past 14 years.
“The greenhouse was kind of his place,” said Mr. Merriman, who has helped out during flower season, from March to June. “He took pride in what went in the greenhouse; he took pride in the product that came out.”
To break some of the monotony of farm work, Curt Kaelin said, his father would tell stories of his time at Penn State or in the Air Force.
Mr. Kaelin also is survived his wife of 56 years, Ellen Kaelin, and a grandson.
The family will receive friends from 10 this morning until the funeral services begins at 11 a.m. at Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church, 2500 Brandt School Road, Wexford.
The family suggests donations to Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church.